It is always a good idea to talk to your primary care practitioner, the clinician who knows you best, about procedures suggested consulting physicians.

A recent Kaiser Health News article http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org * noted: “The medical profession has historically been reluctant to condemn unwarranted but often lucrative tests and treatments that can rack up costs to patients but not improve their health and can sometimes hurt them. But in 2012, medical specialty societies began publishing lists of at least five services that both doctors and patients should consider skeptically. So far, 54 specialty societies have each offered recommendations and distributed them to more than a half-million doctors.”

“Some specialists did target their own money-makers. Gastroenterologists, radiologists and clinical pathologists all placed their own tests on their lists. The Society of General Internal Medicine recommended against the annual physical exam, a mainstay of American health care.”

“The American College of Cardiology opted to list the use of cardiac testing in four circumstances. But the college did not tackle what studies suggest is the most frequent type of overtreatment in the field: inserting small mesh tubes called stents to prop open arteries of patients who are not suffering heart attacks, rather than first prescribing medicine or encouraging a healthier lifestyle.”

“The cardiologists did discourage one specific use of stenting, where doctors opening a clogged artery place additional stents in other places where screenings have spotted the starts of blockage. Stents are a profit center for the group of cardiologists who perform procedures, often known as invasive cardiologists.”

* to read the full KHN article ”Doctors Overlook Lucrative Procedures When Naming Unwise Treatments” by Jordan Rau, highlight and click on open hyperlink http://www.kaiserhealthnews.org/Stories/2014/April/14/doctors-overlook-own-lucrative-procedures-when-naming-others-unwise.aspx?utm_campaign=KHN%3A+Daily+Health+Policy+Report&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=12504957&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-8tD7-ByVo29KxB6MW3r-Y3nGAVDyaGfvuu_TEEezn_hTn_cfi4rz3d7CQvGAUmWhuyL4KhTZxs7uz_8NXLGfqSEX3w24EdAaZ2sEhfW5BSXdeoU4k&_hsmi=12504957